Servant of the People MP Sobolevsky declared millions but did not explain their origin – journalists

Yuriy Sobolevskyi, First Deputy Chairman of the Kherson Regional Council and a member of parliament from the Servant of the People party, lives a lifestyle that doesn’t reflect his declared income. His official income is 60,000 hryvnias per month, according to an investigation by the ” Schemes ” project, published on Tuesday, November 4.

Sobolevskyi, who has become one of the Kherson region’s most prominent public figures since the full-scale invasion, officially earns approximately 60,000 hryvnias per month. However, as Schemes investigators have established, his family’s lifestyle and financial assets raise serious questions about the legality of his income.

Journalists recorded key changes in Sobolevsky’s financial situation in 2019, when he headed Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s campaign headquarters in the Kherson region. That year, Sobolevsky’s asset declaration included $50,000, €40,000, and almost 1 million hryvnias—all in cash.

During this same period, the Sobolevsky family spent over 600,000 hryvnias on acquiring property rights to an apartment in a Kyiv residential complex and another 300,000 hryvnias on other expenses. Thus, according to journalists’ calculations, the family’s financial situation improved by over 3.5 million hryvnias in one year, without any declared sources to explain such an increase.

Despite the lack of declared vehicles, journalists discovered that Sobolevsky’s family uses a valuable 2020 Volkswagen Touareg SUV. The car is registered to the official’s father-in-law, pensioner Andrey Borisenko, who officially earned less in his lifetime than the car’s value.

Borisenko himself confirmed in a comment to journalists that his daughter is the one who primarily uses the car.

The official’s daughter, an assistant to Servant of the People MP Pavlo Pavlish, has repeatedly posted photos of her travels and expensive vacations on social media. Her posts feature her mother driving the aforementioned car. The official’s family has traveled to France, Germany, the Czech Republic, Turkey, and Dubai, although none of the family members has any official source of income.

According to border crossing records, Sobolevsky’s wife and children left Ukraine in the same Volkswagen Touareg in March 2022. They returned only in August 2023, having spent about a year and a half abroad. Journalists established that the family resided in the German city of Augsburg. However, the official’s declaration for the relevant period contains no information about renting or using housing abroad free of charge.

In a comment to journalists, the official claimed he earned the money through his work as a lawyer. Regarding the car, he noted that he and his wife contributed their own money, but he didn’t declare it because his wife only uses it occasionally, and so he didn’t consider it “fundamental or significant.”